A’s Owner Given Mitchell Block, Iraq, and Rights to Develop Synthetic Life Forms in Exchange
In a brilliant move that will get Supervisor Blanca Alvarado’s long-stalled and litigious legacy project at the county fairgrounds back on track, A’s owner and real estate magnate Lew Wolff has agreed to tackle the deteriorating morass in exchange for a vacant block of downtown property, a war-ravaged country and the potential to own a new species.
“I was never interested in that barren landscape,” said Wolff referring to the fairgrounds property, “but a new human race was just too lucrative to pass up.”
Although Wolff says the public must have patience with the progress of the Mitchell block and Iraq, he assured an anxious downtown community and congressional democrats that these two “war-torn” landscapes would be a priority, but first, work on the new species would begin immediately.
“Iraq will be a project that might take decades to see to fruition,” warned Wolff, “and the Mitchell block will take even longer, but a simple human life form doesn’t need permits, a public vote or Labor Council blessing.”
U. S. scientist Craig Venter, hired to spearhead the project, says that the goal is to have a functioning species within the year.
“Humans have approximately 25,000 genes,” he said. “Our organism will be much simpler and only contain about 400 genes—just enough to function as a county supervisor.”
If I were grading this in a writing class, I’d have to flag a confusing antecedent in the first paragraph.
Is the “deteriorating morass” the fairgrounds property or Blanca Alvarado herself?
I don’t know the specifics of the Wolff deal with the city and SJSU, but what I do know is that it is the right way to look at deals – by using creative methods and means of financing – and not asking the city for huge subsidies.
Uriel-
Sorry for the confusion – Most people that know me understand that I use English like a second language…
Regardless, I think the the description works either way.
On my 75 minute lightrail ride in this morning I overheard a couple of geekish looking CH workers chatting about how Gonzalez and Guerra have set up a shadow SJ city gov’t in SecondLife replete with virtual mooncakes and lobbyists flush with Linden dollars.
Any of the insiders that hang out here have any additional info?
The fact that the Fairgrounds site is the best and most logical place for Wolff to put his soccer stadium and adjoining youth soccer complex is absolutely lost in the sarcasm of today’s piece.
Our New Cousins
Rockville, Md. (FFN)—Citing sources inside Craig Venter’s Celera Genomics, the Rockville Shopping News today reported that a new human species has been developed, one designed according to specs provided by an unnamed West Coast developer. Although testing is still incomplete, the prototype is said to possess a voracious appetite for junk food, frivolous gadgets, and Third World goods, while demonstrating a distinct hunger for pop culture and impressive multi-tasking skills. It is rumored that the prototype was able to complete a credit-card purchase while composing a text-message, snapping and forwarding a photograph, rocking to an MP3, and holding up its baggy pants—all the while fighting hunger in Africa.
The new species will be called, Homo Idiota Consumptor-IPod.
Possessing neither gender nor ethnicity, Homo Idiota is designed to be offense-immune, cross-dressing, and soothed by florescent lighting; as such, it is expected to satisfy goals laid out by the National Retail Federation in its ambitious and controversial, Perfect Customer Profile (dubbed by detractors as, The Mutant Mallbot Conspiracy). Our new human cousin has been tweaked so as to desire and consume according to a price-based algorithm designed to react to debt with exponential rewards of dopamine. It is expected that Homo Idiota will, when confronted with bankruptcy, spontaneously orgasm.
Though originally scheduled for release this fall, geneticists are still struggling with one feature demanded by their client, one they knew from the start would be a challenge. In spite of instilling in Homo Idiota an incredible capacity to remain mindless and stationary while consuming entertainment of all types, the prototype continues to demonstrate an acute aversion to one particular activity: watching soccer.
Determined to meet his deadline, Venter has assigned his top people to try to figure out how to do what so far only Nature has accomplished: remove enough cognitive cells from a species so as to enable soccer appreciation without surrendering its ability to guzzle beer to excess.
FF: You make me embarassed as a Sharks fan. Go pound your chest to the rhythm of a “U-S-A!” chant somewhere else. In fact, your preprogrammed American lifestyle should preclude you from liking hockey, too, so I guess you’ve got some changes to make.
That’s a classic FF – tooo funny!
John – #6 deserves a spot in the SJI Friday hall of fame.
AV #9 – Go easy on JM4. Coming up with material isn’t so easy since the circus left town.
Dear San Jose Inside,
On behalf of Dr. Craig Venter and all of us assigned to the Wolff project (Homo Idiota Consumptor-IPod), I would like to thank the entire team at SJI for its fine site and extend my sincere gratitude to two of your bloggers, “Nam Turk in Eastside” and “Lew Wolfe Rocks,” for their invaluable assistance in helping Celera Genomics solve what has been a most vexing problem.
After struggling to overcome HI’s soccer resistance (the bugger wouldn’t even accept free tickets!), one of our researchers, alerted to your blog topic this Friday past, was struck by the fact that the two bloggers who demonstrated the trait we require in HI, that being soccer fanaticism, also demonstrated a startling lack of a second trait, that being a sense of humor. Coincidence, our researcher suggested to his colleagues? Our response, “We think not!”
Needles to say we raced back into the lab. Almost immediately we were faced with a new problem: where in our inventory might we find the necessary genetic material? You see, the process of removing humor from a human species (we call it “droning”) requires more than mere subtraction; it requires the substitution of material (otherwise, the species is psychotic and incompatible with other humans, as we learned with the prototype, Homo Calculatus-Kaczynski).
We racked our brains and scoured our files until someone remembered Homo Accusatrix-Frigidus, a prototype created last year for the National Organization of Women. Eureka! We’d found the source—perfect characteristics for our needs: humorless, unbalanced, hypersensitive, prone to mob mentality. Moments after making the adjustments we tested HI by tuning in a soccer game and he went mad with enthusiasm. We were so excited that we pushed the enveloped and subjected him to the ultimate test: women’s soccer. Victory! Incredible!!
Our efforts have proved so successful that, once we modify the unit to crave sport’s memorabilia, we expect to market it to Major League Soccer as the distinct new species it is so desperately counting on: Homo Fanaticus-Beckham.
Thanks again,
Farley Fourayes
Celera Genomics
#6 :
Oh, so those Home Idiota Consumer Ipods I met in Manchester and Munich were not really our cousins, eh? Or was it job already done for Venter? I can clearly vouch they display voracious appetite for junk food, frivolous gadgets, and Third World goods, while demonstrating a distinct hunger for pop culture and impressive multi-tasking skills. Not just a prototype, an actual production model can already complete a credit-card purchase while composing a text-message, snapping and forwarding a photograph, rocking to an MP3, and holding up its baggy pants—all the while fighting hunger in Africa.
But wait, there’s more!!
Such a creature has already shown strong soccer appreciation without surrendering its ability to guzzle beer to excess.
What? What? What’s that you said? Those creatures and places they dwell in such as Munich and Manchester, they don’t qualify as part of our world? Got it. It must be removal of cognitive cells, which must have led to that mix-up. I’ll let the reader infer whose cognitive cells are being referred to here. But the conclusion is, those “cousins” I met are not cousins after all. They are aliens dwelling on another planet.
But guess what, as far as Venter is concerned, it’s a job already done. No need to reinvent the wheel. Time to move their labs and even production facilities to other planets, then.
Please love me. Please. I’ll even recycle that joke you liked before. It’s like satirical and stuff.
Please,
frustrated finfan
Please, please, someone pay attention to me, please!!! It’s like, I’m so capable of this new advanced concept called satire, and like, parody, and like, ahem, like sarcasm. And like, I’m so first to the scene with this thing called “humor”, nobody in the history of any genetic species could’ve ever come across it. Methinks I’ll file a patent for it and claim nobody will be capable of using it other than me.
And mealsothinks (that’s a word I already patented, so don’t you dare use it) I’m so qualified to make hyperbolic satirical statements on a domain me knows nothing about, except to pick up bits of random sound-bite pieces and run too. Methinks I’ll coin a new name for this trait and call it “finfanism”, and like get it patented, and like plead ya’ll to pay so much attention to me. And like, ya’ll shall clap and everything after I’ve left the stage and everything, right? Like, like, please say so, or all those patents of mine would go to waste. Please don’t do that to me, OK?!?!?!?!?!
Sincerely,
frustrated finfan
P.S. The “frustrated” part in my name not be a coincidence, like the spectrum of electromagnetic radiation in a rainbow not be coincidence. Got it, got it? If you really be paying attention, that is!
FF- Hilarious!!! You saved an otherwise so-so Friday piece from JM4 with your post. As an early SJI reader, I agree with Novice—keep it up. You at least have a sense of humor. Don’t listen to the newby “Haters” who started to post here.
#7 It’s a Friday humor piece! Get It?!!! Don’t get your panties all in an uproar. It is possible to dislike soccer without being a xenophobic nationalist. There are folks in many countries around the globe that can’t get into soccer.
BTW FF’s post was “against” the mainstream consumer programming you see in today’s culture. I know it maybe a difficult concept for some to comprehend, but FF is writing what is known as—SATIRE.
Mellow out and enjoy the weekend.
A few thoughts on land use issues discussed this week in the Merc. and at SJI.
A good spot for a new Spartan Stadium would be at Stockton and Julian. The old 28 acre Cal Can site is located close to 87, hotels, restaurants, light rail, the airport, and the train station. A back enterance could be made from Coleman, conecting it to 880. Additional parking could be used at the Arena when needed. Part of the old cannery site is now used as a service yard by PG&E and the back side, by Coleman, has about 250,000 sq. ft. of mid century tilt up warehouses. The RDA could give Wolf their Westinghouse Warehouse site, also at Stockton and Julian, for highrise housing. SJS could sell their practice field to also help pay for the project.
Next, San Jose should trade the old City Hall for land at the Fair Grounds as the Merc pointed out this week. It however should not be used for a SJ fire training station. A training station should be on cheap land in South SJ. SJ should move the Flee Market out to the Fair Grounds where they could generate some taxes. No way will a “Santana Row” type complex work on the site. And even if it would, it belongs downtown. .
Great writing but I always hate to hear about these people who screwed up san jose whatever they are doing now. Look at Blanca Alvarado responsible for the Mextican hertiage mess now she’s screwing up the County. Another good move to bring a music hall to the fairgrounds. I believe she is a joke and so are most of them. Get them out of office.
What makes insulting soccer so much fun here is the resulting overreaction. Perhaps if the game’s most zealous proponents were really convinced of its future in this market, the meaningless words of a detractor having fun wouldn’t drive them so insane. I can’t imagine getting the same reaction had I picked on football, baseball, or basketball.
Dos Dimwits doth protest too much, methinks.
#15 LLL – If I were trading the City Hall site for the Fairgrounds site, I’d hold out for a first round draft pick or two before making the deal.
Then again, we’d just have to vote on the whole thing anyway because “it’s for the good of the city”.
Ah, Blanca, who seems to seriously believe that re-posting Mexican Consul Figueroa from San Ohaze to Paris is some sort of punishment or demotion for his outspokenness. Imagine!
A vain attempt to revive a moribund and lackluster career. She’ a great argument for setting total term limits—X number of years for all elected positions combined.